I Love You, AT&T! Sort of...

Well… How about that? About eight minutes ago, Engadget received a statement from AT&T, stating:

The language added on March 30 to AT&T's wireless data service Terms and Conditions was done in error. It was brought to our attention and we have since removed it. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.

I guess that's reason to celebrate after just posting a blog about how upset I was. But as my friend Changren pointed out, which I suspect as well, the error wasn't done by AT&T in poor judgment, but rather that the error itself was being discovered by angry users.

How the hell can you write something in error, especially when it was extremely detailed and broad, covering almost everything? Oh well, apologies accepted.

AT&T, You've Outdone Yourself!

Congratulations, AT&T! You have yet outdone yourself when it comes to f**king over your customers! It was barely two years ago when you changed your terms and conditions to include a threat to suspend/terminate any customer contract if you think I engage in conduct that you believe "tends to damage the name or reputation of AT&T, or its parents, affiliates and subsidiaries."

Well, thank you very much for not terminating my service with you when I wrote that blog entry criticizing you for that s**tty terms of service. But just so you know, I'm going to criticize you yet again today.

What the f**k is wrong with you?!? Last night, you updated your Terms and Conditions, and I have beef with your 2. WIRELESS DATA SERVICE TERMS AND CONDITIONS chapter, I. 8. Prohibited and Permissible Use section, to effectively disallow "downloading movies using P2P file sharing services, customer initiated redirection of television or other video or audio signals via any technology from a fixed location to a mobile device, web broadcasting, and... any applications that tether the device... to Personal Computers or other equipment."

Seriously, no tethering, even if I don't use more bandwidth than I would otherwise normally use natively on my N95 smartphone?

Seriously, I can't install applications, such as Google Maps or Skype, since these applications are software that "maintain continuous active Internet connections" whenever I'm driving around or VoIP'ing?

Seriously, I can't set up my N95 smartphone's email client to stay connected all the time and check my email every minute?

Seriously, I can't use my N95 smartphone to take a picture, and instantly upload the picture using my "unlimited data plan" to Facebook via Mobile Uploader, or the Flickr application, because "applications, including, but not limited to, Web camera posts" are strictly prohibited?

What the f**k?!?

I love you, but I truly hate you. Really. But I'm going to continue using my N95 as I have always, and if you cut me off, I'll see you in court!

A Reason Why I Hate Apple

When the car was invented, one of the first interfaces between man and machine was the steering device. The original cars came with tillers, but it was quickly replaced by a steering wheel. This basic method of interface revolutionized the entire automotive industry.

Imagine if the very simple steering wheel was patented. Or worse yet, the whole concept of an adjustable direction wheels in a vehicle was patented. If that had happened, there won't be as many automotive manufacturers out there today as there are, simply because someone patented those and hampered innovation. But the means of achieving automotive steering has always been patented, such as worm and sector, recirculating ball, rack and pinion, and variable rack and pinion. In fact, if either the steering wheel or the whole concept of adjustable direction wheels were patented, all these innovative ways of doing the same thing will never come to fruition, and we will be so far behind the technological curve as it stands today.

Now, think of that analogy, and apply that to Apple's interim CEO Tim Cook and his recent hint towards possibly suing companies that produce multi-touch screens. In my point of view, that is akin to patenting the steering wheel, or the whole adjustable direction wheel concept.

Seriously? Yes, Apple can patent, as they did, how the multi-touch works, and its approach. But simply calling other companies who happened to have multi-touch behavior a rip-off? That's going slightly too far. I am pretty sure that the Palm Pre has totally different ways of achieving human-machine interaction with its multi-touch screen than Apple's iPhone, despite having the very basic conceptual idea. The same is probably true with Samsung's TouchWiz system.

I think the whole idea of calling others ripping off Apple's multi-touch system is completely out of line. If they truly believe that, then the first company who came up with gestures should sue Apple for stealing that idea. If that were the case, I'm sure Apple will fight back with something like, "Well, the logic and magic behind how it translates from physical to system interaction movement is totally different." And that would be acceptable, and Apple can rest easy.

In my analogy, the multi-touch input is the steering wheel input. The different mechanisms that allow the multi-touch in the iPhone is the underlying software, and its counterpart in the analogy is the different steering mechanisms such as the worm and sector, recirculating ball, rack and pinion, and variable rack and pinion steering methods.

Bottom line? Apple's got to stop being a greedy little bitch and stop making all these outlandish threats. If they decide to sue others for emulating multi-touch interface, albeit in different methodologies as Apple's, then I sure hope that this silly pursuit of greed will bankrupt their tight asses. (The tight asses reference will be discussed more later with another reason why I hate Apple blog entry.)

And thus my one reason why I hate Apple.

Yet Another iPhone Commentary

So last night, I met a nice guy (whose name shall remain anonymous) who was a staunch iPhone fanatic. He works in the technology field just like me. And we had a HUGE debate about my Nokia N95 versus his Apple iPhone, after a mutual friend explained that I was that iPhone hater who wrote that blog. Apparently, he had read my previous post reviewing the iPhone.

He started off with telling me how flawed my reviews were. As he picked one by one each of my points I had mentioned, the underlying theme of the debate had turned into technology. My argument was that 3G technology has been around for so many years, why would a bleeding technology company such as Apple not incorporate 3G? His response was that by including 3G, the iPhone will have to be thicker and the battery life will be shorter.

My response was that the inclusion of 3G in the iPhone wouldn't have made a significantly thicker iPhone than it is today. Furthermore, battery life should not be a factor, because everybody knows 3G inherently burns more energy. If you take the same car and drive down the same highway, but in one instance you drive it at 65 miles per hour in just the third gear, and in another instance you drive it at the same speed but in fifth gear, it becomes a no brainer that you wouldn't go nearly as far on the same tank of gas if you limit yourself to just the third gear. But you would have unbelievably high torque to work with.

Another reason why battery life wouldn't matter is because if Nokia's Symbian software could include the ability for me to set the phone to use just GSM, 3G, or combination of both depending on priority, why couldn't Apple have done the same thing? Steve Jobs' claim that the inclusion of 3G in the iPhone will drastically drain the battery. But that's assuming that it is operating on 3G only. Is there a need to be tied to the 3G protocol when you're not using your phone, just sitting there waiting to receive a call? No. A smart computer company such as Apple could have easily added similar toggle, just like Samsung has with its Blackjack, or any other company that manufactures 3G capable phones.

A point that no one in the iPhone camp want to even address is the fact that, yes, 3G protocol can eat up your battery juice pretty fast, but in real life, does it? Think of it this way... We all know from dslreports.com that AT&T's 3G network is capable of downloading at 1 Mbps (megabits per second), almost as fast as high speed DSL Internet connection at home. Not to mention that I have routinely hit that transfer rate for the most part of my web browsing time. But the older EDGE technology network (which iPhone relies on for its Internet browsing) only has the transfer rate of 100 kbps, which amounts to about 10% of the 3G download speed.

So if I were to go to a data-heavy website like MySpace.com, I might have burned up more battery juice at the rate I download the page, but it would only take me about 5 seconds to complete the page download on my N95. Compare that to the iPhone, which may take about 15 to 20 seconds to complete the page download. Sure, the battery consumption rate is slower on the iPhone than my N95, but you spend almost 4 times longer burning up the battery. In the end, isn't that negligible? It's like burning gas at 20 miles per gallon (rate) if you drive a distance of 20 miles at a faster speed, versus burning gas at 35 miles per gallon (rate) over the same distance but at a crawling speed. In the end, you spend more time burning gas just to cover 20 miles, even though the rate of gas burn-off is slower while driving slowly than driving fast.

Why can't iPhone lovers not understand this mere fact? Expert unbiased reviews have not deducted points off of the Nokia N95 in any comparison tests to the Apple iPhone because 3G uses more battery, mostly because they know this fact. But go to a web site that practically puts Apple on the altar as its god will always use this 3G battery utilization as a "winning" argument, never mind the fact that it'll take the iPhone longer to download the same content.

During this debate about the inclusion of the 3G chip, I theorized that the true reason why Apple did not include the 3G chip is probably because they want the iPhone to be as profitable as possible. Currently, any cellular phone manufacturer who includes 3G capabilities pay a small fee to Qualcomm, because Qualcomm holds the patents on some, if not most, of the underlying 3G communication technologies. It's either that, or they pay Qualcomm to use Qualcomm's chips in the cell phone. Either way, it eats into the profitability of a cellular phone. But my friend wouldn't hear of this.

Now, I suspect this is the case, because Apple only decided to bring a 3G-capable iPhone to the market "sometime in 2008" well after Nokia's legal battle with Qualcomm has commenced. Qualcomm feels like they deserve to be paid licensing fees for the use of their 3G technology, whereas Nokia's argument is that such a universally broad application should become public domain. Of course, the legal battle between these two companies is far from over, but I strongly suspect, as do Steve Jobs, that Nokia will prevail in the end. Once Qualcomm's claim to key 3G technology becomes public domain, Apple can include any 3G chipset they want for a lower cost than now. Of course, once the legal battle ends favorably for Nokia, well, the price of existing 3G phones will drop like flies from the sky, and future models will start selling for cheaper. My whole point here is that I don't think it is mere coincidence that Steve Jobs would hint at a 3G version of the iPhone when the legal battle between Nokia and Qualcomm got heated up in the last two months.

On a final note regarding 3G, Steve Jobs have also said that he is waiting for a company to provide a 3G chipset that could use lower power. There are some in the industry who believe that Broadcom's new BCM21551 chipset might be the answer to Steve Jobs' prayers, but let's not forget that companies like Broadcom do not sell their products exclusively to a single original equipment manufacturer. In fact, when Broadcom announced its revolutionary chipset, they have also indicated that they have sent samples of the chip to several companies. So by the time the iPhone includes 3G with lower battery consumption than it is today, let's not forget that companies like Nokia will probably be using the same thing from Broadcom or similar from another chipset manufacturer that will even out the playing field. All of a sudden, the same Nokia N95 manufactured after the adoption of the new chip becomes less power hungry! (Just like the same Xbox 360 built after October 18, 2007 suddenly became less power hungry, because Microsoft began using the Falcon motherboard. Same product, but a vast improvement due to the availability of better raw materials.)

Now, another sore point of discussion I had with this friend was regarding the browser. I don't understand why Apple fans seem to claim that the Safari browser is entirely Apple's brainchild. Only Apple fanatics who are also true technology enthusiasts will realize that the Safari web browser is based on the open source development of WebKit. I told him that for almost three years now, the Symbian S60 operating system (which Nokia has implemented on the Nokia N95, as well as the majority of the N series) has always included web browsers based on the very same open source WebKit. In fact, Nokia's decision to ditch their own home-brewed browser for the open source WebKit was announced on November 2, 2005!

What I could not get across to my friend was the fact that Nokia for a while has been able to browse the full Internet long before Apple's claims in their iPhone advertisements that the iPhone is the first to be able to browse the real Internet Internet. His defense? He doesn't watch TV, so he isn't aware of the specific television advertisement I was referring to. Never mind the fact that all of Apple's iPhone advertisements are available for viewing on Apple's website.

What bothers me the most is that most people share the same misconception as my friend, that the Safari browser is purely Apple's own technology. And even on Apple-centric websites, they have written in articles in such a way that they call the open source WebKit the "Safari WebKit," as if WebKit was a product of Apple! How would you feel if you put Shell gasoline in the Honda, and begin calling the same gasoline the Honda gasoline? And then further perpetuate the misleading fact by talking about other products, like a Land Rover, that it copied Honda by using the Honda gasoline? Seriously! WebKit is not Apple's product, much like the gasoline is not Honda's product!!!

Of course, my friend thought the Safari browser was based on the KDS, which I thought was kind of weird in the fact that KDS is a shell environment for Unix. I countered the fact that it was based on the same engine as Mozilla, which of course he disputed. In reality, the Mozilla browser is not based on the open source WebKit. I thought it was because a few months ago, Mozilla has publicly opined that they might ditch the Gecko engine and base Mozilla 2.0 on WebKit. I thought the decision had been made, but a quick research revealed not to be the case. So I was wrong in stating that the Safari browser uses the same technology as Mozilla-based browsers.

In any case, his whole closing argument was that all my points of review on the iPhone was all flawed, basing purely on the fact that consumers are willing to get the iPhone because they are well aware of the limitations iPhone has. To this point, I strongly disagree that any of my arguments are flawed, because if a consumer never has owned a real smartphone like some of Nokia's offering and then make the jump to the iPhone, it is by far a huge step forward including the limitations. But for early technology adopters like myself, for whom the N95 is his fifth real smartphone in as little as four years, it is certainly a hard pill to swallow and accept the iPhone when you know that all the features you've relied on just don't exist in the iPhone. Can you imagine having lived with a mouse on a computer for several years, but then Apple makes a sleek new computer but left out the mouse, leaving you with just the keyboard? Once you're accustomed to certain new technology features, especially for years, and especially when such features are already common standards from most manufacturers, it doesn't make any sense whatsoever for Apple to exclude those features in the iPhone.

That is why I maintain that the iPhone was a rushed project. Apple should have waited longer before launching the iPhone. I suspect that they couldn't wait a day longer because the Nokia N95 was already a one year old smartphone. I also suspect that Apple knew that Nokia has been developing a touch interface for years now that they thought if Apple rushes through the iPhone development and become the first to put a touch interface product in the market, then it doesn't matter who came up with the idea first. And in business sense, that is absolutely true. But it all still boils down to the fact that the iPhone, other than its touch interface, is still a far inferior product than any of the "new" generation of smartphones from Nokia that has been around for a couple years.

Who knows? Maybe Steve Jobs will finally realize his mistakes (making his target sales goal and fattening up the company's bottom line with an inferior product hardly counts as a mistake, right?) and fix everything that is wrong with the current iPhone come 2008. But I'll wait till that day comes before I pass judgment. If it passes my standards and expectations of what a converging smartphone should be, then don't be surprised that I might simply ditch my Nokia N95 for the Apple iPhone 2.0.

Stay tuned for a future review of the second generation iPhone. =)

Why Don't Wii Play

So yeah… I blame my friend Changren for something... One thing.

The last time I played a video game was back in middle school. The first and last video game system I have ever "owned" was the NES, the Nintendo Entertainment System. If there is ever an item representing old school, that would be it.

Later on, in 2001, my first roommate in Kansas City bought a Microsoft Xbox system. He had some kind of a fighting game, along with Halo. He offered me to play Halo with him, and I sucked. Not only did I get some kind of a thumb pain syndrome, but the sheer number of buttons on the Xbox was a little bit daunting. Intimidating would be a better word.

Anyway, after just playing Halo on Xbox for about a quarter of an hour, I simply gave up. Screw this! I threw the controller on the floor, and exclaimed, "This is ridiculous! How the hell do you keep track of eight buttons on a freaking controller?!? What happened to the two buttons, just A and B buttons?!?"

So yeah, playing Xbox for 15 minutes hardly count as real playing. So the NES is the one and only system I've ever played. Now, fast forward to Thanksgiving 2007. Instead of staying home in Chicago and doing the whole turkey dinner thing, I chose to fly out to Seattle on a last minute whim and go kick off the skiing season with my friend Changren and his girlfriend at Whistler, British Columbia.

The plan was to drive up to Canada on Thanksgiving Day, relax that evening, ski on Friday and Saturday, then spend Saturday evening and Sunday morning chilling in Vancouver.

It was during the time while we were at Vancouver where the whole incident happened.

I'm kind of technology savvy. So I have known for a while that the new generation of video game systems has already come out from both Microsoft (Xbox 360), Sony (Playstation 3) and Nintendo (Wii). Yet, I am not one of those people who play video games. When I heard in the news about how long lines were when each of the aforementioned gaming systems went on sale, I laughed heartily. "Those foolish idiots," I'd say. Or something similar.

But while I was in Vancouver, we all went to Changren's friend's place, who happened to have a Wii. To kill time, we all started playing a little bit of Wii Tennis. Although I have never played the game before, but have the training in real tennis, I thought it would not take me long to beat my friend, who is a self-proclaimed "Best Wii Tennis Player."

Needless to say, I kept on losing. But the bigger amazement was the fact that the Wii was easy to play with. I knew how to operate the controller effortlessly in less than 15 minutes, compared to the myriad of confusing buttons in the Xbox I encountered back in 2001!

Alas, despite the short learning curve of the Wii, my friend whopped my ass in Wii Tennis repeatedly. I even tried going for best out of five instead of three, but still lost. And my desire to beat my friend suddenly turned into a scary craving for the Wii. I have lived all of my adult life pretty satisfied without some mind-numbing entertainment device that is hooked up to a television. But as soon as I returned to Chicago, I have suddenly resolved to getting my hands on a Nintendo Wii.

Unfortunately, a quick look-see through many websites and local retailers revealed that the Wii is so hugely popular, despite being out for a year now, that it is sold out. Worse yet, many respectable retailers are practicing near-illegal sales tactics: Bundling the Wii with a bunch of stuff, most of which are not desirable like crappy games, and selling at a higher "bundle" price. It may be a good deal if you so happen to enjoy all the games they bundle, but most likely they're simply crappy games I would never buy.

Facing such a situation like a crack addict unable to find affordable crack, I grew anxious and twitchy. Before long, I became desperate. A browsing through CraigsList revealed that those wanting a quick profit have managed to buy tons of Nintendo Wii and offer them for sale at a significant markup. A $250 gaming system going for $400 up to $550?!? Holy crap! That was worse than daylight robbery! I simply didn't realize that there was such a huge demand for the Nintendo Wii.

Then on Saturday the first of December, Rosa and I happened upon a Best Buy in Evanston while on a targeted shopping spree. I walked around the store secretly hoping that perhaps the demand for Wii affected only Chicago, not a tiny little suburb. Unfortunately, I soon knew enough that the inevitable had happened. Out of stock.

I was ready to give up and leave the store, but Rosa convinced me that I should talk to a store employee and see if perhaps they had any Wiis in the back. I was quite skeptical, but decided to ask an employee nonetheless, only because there were a couple of them talking amongst themselves who were within a few feet.

Of course, the answer was obvious. They were out. As I said my thank you and began to leave, one of them piped up and said, "But just so you know, we are getting 18 Wiis tonight, and they will be on sale tomorrow morning."

WHAT?!?

After asking repeatedly if they were for real and in fact will be getting stock, I got really excited. The thing that sucks about the whole situation, though, is the fact that I would have to go wait in line at the butt crack of dawn. And with just 18 units for sale, chances were pretty good that there will be more than 10 people camping out at the store that evening.

One thing about me is for sure. I'm not a morning person, and even as a crack addict shaking violently for the next hit, I probably wouldn't be waiting in line in the freezing rain for a bag of crack. But I found a way out. You see, another friend of mine had wronged me severely that I thought he could quite possibly make it up to me as he had promised. He could go wait in line for me!

Surprisingly, my friend agreed. But having a sense of doubt that he would be there in line as I had asked, I decided to go there myself. Besides, the prospect of getting my hands on a Wii was so nerve wrecking that I tossed and turned sleeplessly throughout the night. Even though I myself was late in getting to the Best Buy at Evanston, I quickly noticed that my friend had just gotten there too. But he wasn't in the line. Instead, he was texting in the car, while his brother tagged along. He wanted to let me know that there were more than 18 people in the line, and he was giving up and heading home.

So I told him that I was going to take my chances, and that he could leave. No sense for him to be out there in the cold when I was already there. I thought that there was a good chance that A) the store would only sell one unit per customer, and B) not every single individual in line was there for a Wii. I was pretty sure that the big family of five was probably only buying one, but I wouldn't know for sure. So I took my chances.

About an hour before the store was to open for the day, an employee came out of the store with a stack of paper, telling us that he will be passing out certificates guaranteeing those who possess them will be walking out of the store that day with a Wii, and that they wouldn't need to wait in line.

I got really nervous. With just 18 units and almost 30 people in front of me, I thought I was screwed. As I watched the employee inch slowly down the line, I counted the certificates. I hoped against hope that the people in front of me were groups or families who only wanted one. Then I counted 18. Crap!

But strangely, he was still passing out certificates. But I wasn't sure how many he had. Then suddenly, he stood in front of me, and gave me one. Hooray! But after the employee passed out a certificate to a guy at the end of the line, I noticed that he still had some in his hand. I asked him, "Just exactly how many do you have?" "We have about thirty-something left."

I instantly thought, "Maybe I can score one for my sister too!" So I called Rosa, woke her up, and asked her to get to the Best Buy, since she lived pretty close. And my other friend was probably back in bed, so I didn't bother calling him. As time went by while waiting for Rosa to show up, people started to trickle in, hoping to score a Wii. They were mostly shocked that they got one, because they seemed pretty dismayed at the line already there, despite half the people went home with their certificates (which were good till noon that day). Some didn't even bother getting in line, and instead turned around and got in the car. Normally, I would have helped them out and told them that they had more certificates, but not knowing how many were left, I wanted to make sure I get one for my sister.

Finally, Rosa showed up. And surprisingly, she got a certificate. In my jubilation, she reminded me repeatedly that I owe her big time, which I acknowledged. And then, my other friend called. Apparently not wanting to let me down, instead of returning home, he went to the Best Buy on Fullerton to get in line. I told him not to worry about it, because I had gotten a certificate.

Before I knew it, he was back in Evanston with his brother, waiting in line. There were only three certificates left, and my friend and his brother got two. And a funny thing happened. As the employee stood there with the last and final certificate numbered 78, everybody could see there were people just rolling in to score a Wii. Two cars drove past the employee so they could park, and a third car with kids were there by the curb. They wanted the employee to hand the last certificate to them, but the employee told them that they had to go get it.

Excitement quickly built up, one of the guys who had finally parked the car started walking over. The people at the end of the line started screaming, "Hurry up! He's only got one left." To everybody's amazement, the kids didn't even get out of the car. Instead, they were debating and asking the employee to just go over and hand over the certificate. Then the guy who had just parked finally started running over, and snatched the certificate. The kids then asked, "Do you have any more?" They were given a rude awakening. Everybody in the line could not believe that mere laziness stood in the way of them getting a Wii. Unbelievable!

Long story short, the store finally opened, and I got a Wii. And it is fun and crazy addicting. I cannot believe that in nearly 30 years of my life, I have never waited in line for anything, until now. Well, I don't count waiting in line for the embassy to open so that I could get a visa to Malaysia, as for some strange reason the embassy only process a set number of visa requests a day. Weird.

Anyway, that is the story on how I accidentally got the Wii. By pure chance. And I didn't even see the Sunday ad for Best Buy either.

Sa-wiit!!! =)

Halloween Pub Crawl Costume Dilemma

I suppose I've been more concerned with running the past half of the year that I really haven't given much thought on anything else as far as personal fun goes. After the Chicago Marathon on October 7, my mind was immediately set on the Nike Women's Half Marathon come this Sunday, October 21. And I can tell you that I won't be setting any personal records there, especially with the famed hills and the recovery time I'm still in.

Of course, my friend Maria asked me just the other day what costume I'd be wearing for the Halloween Pub Crawl, assuming that I would go. I guess her assumption was well placed, considering that I do enjoy dressing up and drinking like a fish. Once in a while, of course. Right then and there, I was suddenly stricken with a million dollar question, with barely enough time to plan since the pub crawl is on October 28!

Oh shit!

Well, this morning I thought my prayers were answered when I saw something in my Inbox with the following subject: Get inspired to build a geeky Halloween costume! I work in a geeky field, so I might try to be a super geek! I read through the email real quick while I got ready for work, and I thought it was a novel idea to be a walking, real Pac-Man arcade machine. All the while, I was thinking the costume was a play on words, with something of a sexual innuendo. I was going to be that this Halloween Pub Crawl.

Of course, when I returned to my hotel after work and dinner with friends, I decided to open the link. OMG! It is a real Pac-Man game with a freaking controller! A quick see-through of the "ingredients" needed revealed that you have to be someone who can freaking build a moving robot to assemble a home-made arcade game as a freaking costume. Worst of all? You have to wear a freaking laptop!

If time was on my side, and if I'm remotely good with doing anything electronic, I might be tempted to follow through with this idea. But simply put, I'm a practical man. A very practical man. The first thought that jumped to my mind when I saw a picture of the poor fella who created and wore this geek machine was: How the hell do you pee in urinals?!? As someone who thinks and plans ahead a lot and well experienced in pub crawling, easy access to urinals and easy way to relief myself is second nature to me like the fight-or-flight-reaction instilled in our human brain.

Who creates a monstrosity that will add burden to your pee routine? If it wasn't so freaking gay for a guy to wear a skirt, I'd pick any costume that involves skirts for Halloween just for the sake of being able pee with great ease that is a time-saver. I mean, who wants to neglect that frosty bottle of brewsky and drink warm beer? Definitely not yours truly.

Back to the drawing board I go again...

Apple Commercial Spoof!

So yeah, I was searching for the Apple iPhone adverts on the Internet when I came across some totally awesome mock adverts.

Remember how Apple has this longstanding campaign on television where two guys representing a Mac and PC talk, and the Mac avatar kept on dissing the PC avatar for its "superiority?" Well, the mock adverts I found took the exact same concept, but turned the tables around on Apple!

Basically, it's the Apple iPhone versus the Nokia N95, which I proudly own. Anyway, below are the videos. They are hilarious! Enjoy!

Picture Viewing Capabilities



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Camera functionality



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Not the watered down Internet, nor the mobile version of the Internet, nor the kinda sorta looks like Internet Internet (double mock)


The above commercial mocks the Apple iPhone's "Watered Down" commercial shown below:


The above commercial also stretchingly mocks Apple iMac's "Networking" commercial shown below:



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How to get to Seafood Calamari


The above commercial mocks the Apple iPhone's "Calamari" commercial:



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Battery Trip to China



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Cool Ringtone



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All the spoofed commercials can be downloaded in MP4 video format here:
Picture Viewing Capabilities
Camera functionality
Not he watered down Internet, nor the mobile version of the Internet, nor the kinda sorta looks like Internet Internet too!
How to get to Seafood Calamari
Battery Trip to China
Cool Ringtone

AT&T is Awesome!!!

I can tell you that I am a total AT&T die-hard fan. I can even tell you that I am AT&T's number one customer. If they sell mugs with "AT&T is John's favorite wireless carrier of choice," I'd buy a box of them and stash it in my desk drawer.

No joke!

Let's review. Back when I was in college in 1999 or 2000, I made the leap into the 21st century. I felt that I, too, should be in the elite club where its members carry cellular phones. Mind you, I never liked cellular phones when they were the size of standard Kleenex® boxes, but when they got relatively smaller, I wanted one. For safety reasons, of course. And who was my virgin cellular phone's carrier? AT&T!

I went to school in Springfield, Missouri, and if anybody has lived there back then, you would know that Sprint was the first to enter the cellular market in Springfield, and AT&T had little coverage. Yet, I waited it out and bought my first cellular phone from AT&T. Over the Internet, no less. It was definitely a ginormous leap into the 21st century, I tell ya.

While being faithful to a company where I had to be monogamous for two whole years, I interned at Convergys for half a year, a company that wrote the software designed for billing wireless cellular customers with their ever complex rate matrix as well as running call centers for AT&T across the United States. Of course, I don't know if Convergys still do that for AT&T now, or if all of AT&T's customer service operations have been shipped over to India. Nevertheless, AT&T and I were tight.

When I graduated college, I moved to Kansas City in the hopes of making a difference in the world in which I live in. As a naïve young adult, I was quickly disappointed pleased that AT&T didn't have a whole lot of service up there. Despite the fact that Sprint was headquartered in the Kansas City metropolitan area, I was stubborn to avoid Sprint like the Bubonic Plague. After months of carrying the 417 area code, I finally got myself an 816 area code by switching over to Cingular.

Cingular, then, was a joint venture of Bell South and a few other companies. Of course, Bell South was a remnant of AT&T when they were broken up by regulators back in the day. And I was very happy with my Cingular service. So much so that I remained a loyal customer until 2004, when I moved to Chicago.

Again, I was so pleased with my service with Cingular that I kept my 816 area code for a few months while living in Chicago. At that time, I had the Nokia 6340i, one of the most advanced cellular phones sold in the United States. The Nokia 6340i was a true tri-band phone. Not in the frequencies within a technology type, but multiple technologies. It had AMPS technology (a.k.a. analog), TDMA technology (a.k.a. digital), and GSM technology (today's next generation digital).

Despite owning a device that had a blank SIM card with GSM technologies (I was only using the analog and TDMA bands), Cingular wouldn't let me keep my awesome plan, which I had fulfilled my two year lock already, while going into their GSM network. Cingular wanted requested me to sign on to yet another two year contract, and force switch me into buying another phone. Now mind you, at that time, Cingular's GSM network was still in its infancy, despite the fact that they have been developing the network for almost two years. And the first generation GSM-only phones that Cingular carried were slim pickings, as they didn't sell any decent Nokia product save for a couple very basic ones. I wanted to stay with my Nokia 6340i, which was technologically superior albeit its lackluster in the cool department!

I felt that I was being forced asked into a crappy deal, so I went back to AT&T. AT&T at that time had so many choices when it comes to selecting a phone that I felt like a kid in a giant candy store! Furthermore, AT&T had a larger GSM network than Cingular's. I figured that if I have to sign on to a new two year agreement, I might as well get into something better. After all, I was never disappointed by AT&T ever! So I got my very first smartphone in 2004 from AT&T, which was the Nokia 6620 that had a Symbian operating system.

From then on, I was with AT&T all the way until AT&T and Cingular merged. During the time of the merger, AT&T was struggling dealing with profitability problems that there were no good deals as far as their calling plans go (which they called Gold plans during the merger, to differentiate from Cingular's calling plans). And during the transitional period, I decided to "upgrade" into the Cingular's version of calling plans, which was better (at the cost of a renewed two year monogamy requirement). I wanted the Rollover Minutes® as well as better Internet data plans. Cingular's plans were awesome for the money.

So back to Cingular I was, which I had to update my online bill pay settings from AT&T to Cingular. Everything was good. After moving to Chicago, I never had any problems with dropped calls, or mysteriously losing all signal reception suddenly despite the fact that I had a full bar just seconds prior. Never! All my calls were pristine and crystal clear, as if I was talking in the same room as the other person, in person!

As a loyal customer who have never had an affair with the likes of Sprint, AllTel, Verizon or US Cellular, I am shocked pleased to learn of AT&T's latest Terms of Service, revised today, October 1, 2007.

My shocker-up-the-ass favorite addendum (underlined below) is the 5. Term & Termination chapter, 5.1 Suspension/Termination section:
AT&T may immediately terminate or suspend all or a portion of your Service, any Member ID, electronic mail address, IP address, Universal Resource Locator or domain name used by you, without notice, for conduct that AT&T believes (c) tends to damage the name or reputation of AT&T, or its parents, affiliates and subsidiaries.

Well, how about that?!?

Companies go goo-goo-gaa-gaa when they can use customer testimonials praising their products or services. And likewise, companies have long quietly ignored public criticisms and complaints, and used those feedbacks as a way to improve their product or service.

But now... Is this going too far enough?

What if AT&T's customer service representatives are under-trained, and rude to a lot of customers? Obviously any customer who experiences such rude awakenings pleasantries may be terminated let go if they choose to voice his or her concerns in a public forum, like say a blog such as this.

And if we take this scenario further, what may happen to a reporter who also happens to be an AT&T customer for her cellular and broadband services, whereby she was tasked to investigate reports of a widespread AT&T customer service problem happy time? What if she writes the article in a newspaper? Will her service be terminated unexpectedly disassociated gracefully the night she returns home after the paper hits newsstands?

Hmm... Interesting, huh?

Like I said, I am a loyal AT&T customer who absolutely love AT&T and the kind of corporate giant lovable little company it has become today after being broken up by our anti-trust agency back then.

Yeah, AT&T is awesome!

The iPhone Verdict!!! (updated)

Recently, I wrote about being tempted into succumbing to the Apple iPhone craze, especially after a successful hack becoming generally available and Apple's recent announcement in price cut. But I was still on the fence. Should I jump on the bandwagon? For the right price, I may be willing to buy a superbly inferior product that has just one cool and desirable feature that is the touch user interface.

Well, I can tell you that as of this past Friday, I no longer use my beloved Nokia N91. The Nokia N91 is a device that I have come to love. It is simply the best convergence device the handheld market has ever witnessed, considering it was introduced all the way back in April 27, 2005. It has a 4 GB hard drive for music, a 2 megapixel camera capable of making VGA quality videos with unlimited length, WiFi for wireless web browsing, a web browser that can view the real internet just like the new iPhone (unlike most other phone browsers that can only browse the "watered-down" version of any given website), Bluetooth 2.0 connectivity with many profiles, a built-in radio tuner, and a built-in PDA functionalities that can be synchronized to Microsoft Outlook, Lotus Notes, and Apple Mac OS X PIM software (via iSync). Best of all, the Nokia N91 came wide open, which was ready for any GSM network operator. The N91 came out so long ago that by the time the Apple iPhone was released on June 29 of this year, Nokia has discontinued the N91!

Sure, the iPhone has the really cool touch user interface, but does it perform well when it comes anything else? The answer is a resounding no! There are numerous complaints from several power users that it doesn't work well as its most basic feature: a phone. Personally, not owning the iPhone myself and based on user reports from the Internet and my long and inconsiderate play time with the iPhone at the Chicago Apple store, I suspect that the GSM chip along with the software written by Apple may be faulty. Sure, the iPhone's usability benchmark is ridiculously high, but it sacrifices a lot, namely functionality.

{Update 2007.10.01: The original post had comparison of my old Nokia N91 to the Apple iPhone sandwiched here, but it has been removed and archived to the end of this post as I realized the eight paragraphs were redundant to what follows below.}

Of course, the most damning thing about the iPhone is its marriage to the AT&T service. Owners cannot take the GSM iPhone and pop in SIM cards from other GSM carriers such as T-Mobile or Vodafone. Worse yet, I cannot even pop in my own, current AT&T SIM card into the iPhone without "upgrading" my plan. This has huge ramifications:
1) You are forced to buy AT&T's special iPhone plans that has a $20/month premium above the exact same type of plans on non-iPhone smartphones,
2) You are forced into a two year financial contract for a service that does not even subsidize or offset any part of the iPhone device cost, and
3) You will end up with the most expensive and fanciful paper weight if you applied Apple's feature update to your hacked iPhone.

The supposed update with "new features" and "improvements" coincidentally did not provide much of any useful new features as analyzed by my friend. It did not even address most of the flaws cited by me.

Nah! Yours truly on Friday decided to buy the Nokia N95. Mind you, this smartphone has been available for almost a year since September 26 of 2006, and yet it surpasses the iPhone in every single aspect except for the user interface. So why didn't I buy it at the Nokia Flagship store here in Chicago for the entire last year? Well, it didn't support the US version of 3G networks. And I was very happy with my aging Nokia N91.

Ever since Nokia's announcement on August 29 that they will introduce a US version of the N95 that not only will cost $50 cheaper than the European version sold here for the last year, but will have bigger battery (1200 mAh) and more memory, I have been calling both Nokia Flagship stores in Chicago and New York almost every day to determine its availability. And my patience was rewarded on Thursday, September 27th.

When I finally returned to Chicago on Friday, even the long delay from the medical emergency that got me home so late in the afternoon did little to deter me from getting off the subway train in downtown and hiking over to the Nokia Flagship store on the Magnificent Mile. And when I got home, I could not wait to rip open the box and play with it! The excitement pared with having sex for the very first time!

Granted, the new US version of the Nokia N95 is $100 more than the iPhone's original price, but its features are far more superior than that of the iPhone. The obvious advantages are:
1) Network independence straight out of the box, so anybody with T-Mobile or AT&T or Vodafone can start using it,
2) 3G capability, whereas the iPhone only has EDGE which Nokia's GSM phones have had built-in for many years,
3) A 5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss lens capable of recording 30 frames per second (!!!) video is included, and
4) A powerful music player feature that have long been the standard of any Nokia N series phone for years!

But below are some of the more advanced advantages that you may not know right away:

Knowing your way around: Unlike the iPhone, Nokia provides free maps of over 150 countries. Better still, it has a GPS receiver, so I can see where on the map I am, live!!! And not only is it just a regular GPS device, it is an assisted-GPS, which means that it works in conjunction with the wireless data network to tell you about nearby places of interest and assist in looking for the right satellites! How sweet is that?

Battery replacement without being phoneless: Unlike the iPhone, I can replace the battery in the Nokia N95 anytime I want. I am not forced into paying extra for labor to get the battery replaced, and I don't have to go without my phone for days while Apple replaces the iPhone battery.

Truly the next generation camera-phone: Unlike the iPhone, the Nokia N95 has two (!!!) cameras! One 5 megapixel camera with auto focus Carl Zeiss lens and flash, and another simple one similar to the iPhone's to shoot low quality images for sending to your friends. The iPhone has, uhm, a pretty crappy camera that is crappier than some of the first generation 2 megapixel camera-phones Nokia and Samsung has ever introduced.

Better than an iPod: Unlike the iPhone, the Nokia N95 can play 17 music file formats, including AAC+ which is considered the best audio encoding method, which the iPhone doesn't support. The iPhone can play only nine formats (counting MP3 VBR and standard MP3 as two separate formats is cheating). Furthermore, the N95 has been said by several technical gurus all over to have a better audio codec chip than that in the iPhone and all other Apple iPods, which is the Wolfson codec chip. Translation: the N95 plays music better than the iPhone and iPod when it reaches your ears in terms of audio quality. Sadly though, the chipset that controls the music playback is not as good as the Nokia N91, probably in an effort to reduce power consumption. Luckily for me, a software setting, once enabled, instantly matched the audio quality to that of the Nokia N91, probably at the cost of higher batter consumption.

More than just music: Unlike the iPhone, it has a radio tuner, which doesn't tie me down to only the music I load onto it. This was one of the biggest red marks I have to give the iPhone, because I like to be able to listen to the radio and have my phone too while running without being forced into choosing between carrying two devices for the sake of running safety, or forego either the radio or a cell phone. Radio stations sometimes previews new music not in stores yet, so this is definitely a plus!

Graphics appeal: Unlike the iPhone, the Nokia N95 has a separate, dedicated 3D graphics hardware accelerator! The included 3D games are so freaking sweet! I assume that the N95 hardware specification called for a 3D GPU as part of Nokia's re-focus on the N-Gage platform. The iPhone is rumored to have a 3D graphics coprocessor built onto the main Samsung CPU. Of course, Apple is not known to divulge any technical specification of their products' internal components, so the information is based on technical gurus who took the iPhone apart and analyzed its parts in great detail.

Open platform, unlike Apple's Microsoft Vista approach: Unlike the iPhone, the Nokia N95 is open to any software written for it. So far, I have installed Widsets, a suite of light applications much like the widgets found on Mac OS X; a conversation application that allows me to view my text messages like a regular conversation similar to iPhone's; Opera Mini, which is by far one of the most powerful browsers to supplement the equally-powerful Nokia browser; Google Maps for the mere ability to see live traffic data; a powerful file browser utility that allows me to see protected system files and the entire system structure; PDF reader; a freeware that allows me to view files of Microsoft Office applications; and GMail. Of course, you can do not-so-nearly similar things with the iPhone, but that requires you to hack it. And I'm not even done with loading freeware applications! There is a freeware out there that keeps track of your exercise and keeps track of your distance based on the GPS unit. How cool is that?

Oh, and speaking of iPhone hacks, you do know that Apple will break your iPhone if it is hacked, right?

Better stream than no stream: Like the iPhone, it can also play YouTube videos over the Internet. And unlike the iPhone, it can stream Real Audio videos and music over the Internet, either through WiFi or the 3G data network. iPhone doesn't stream; it requires you to download static videos via iTunes and then synchronize.

Featherweight: After looking at the specification, I was really surprised to see that the Nokia N95 is 11 grams lighter than the Apple iPhone! How about that?!?

Synchronization choices: Unlike the iPhone, I have more than just one way to synchronize my music. With the iPhone, you absolutely must use iTunes. With my N95, I have four different ways, although one of them is sort of illegal. I can synchronize my music through 1) Nokia's PC Suite software, 2) Microsoft Windows Media Player (similarly to how iTunes work with iPod), 3) Connecting the N95 to my computer as a disk drive, and 4) Using iTunes along with the Bad Apple plug-in software. The fourth option isn't specifically for the N95, but any portable music player that is treated as a disk drive when connected to a computer.

"I'm a baller" ringin': Unlike the iPhone, I can pick and choose any music I have on the phone as my ringtone. With the iPhone, you have to use iTunes, purchase an extra 99 cents license to have your downloaded song be set as a ringtone. If you want that Nelly Futardo Promiscuous Girl song as your ringtone, but you don't have the song yet, then you have to pay nearly $2 just for the ability to use that song as your ringtone. Yet another way Apple nickel-and-dimes you.

The Internet Internet: Just like the iPhone, the Nokia N95 also has a browser that lets you see the entire Internet like the way it was meant to be. Personally, I think the zoom/pan/overview feature of the Nokia browser is far superior than the iPhone's Safari, which is nothing more than just zoom in and out and pan. Funnier is the fact that Apple touts this feature as the only one of its kind, Nokia have had this for years. Interestingly, both Nokia and Apple's browsers are both built on the same web development kit!!!

Well, after playing with the Nokia N95 for a couple days, I am freaking in love with it. Sure, it only has a 2.6 inch display that is not touch screen, but it is a high resolution display that works extremely well and has the ability to rotate its rotational view mode! Now that I have experienced the 3G speed that is almost as fast as my home cable modem download speed, I don't think I can ever go back to non-3G phones and browsing the Internet.

Some of you may say that my Nokia N95 is not thin, therefore a disadvantage. Well, let me tell you this: After playing with the Motorola Razr and the Apple iPhone, thin is not exactly all that desirable. Super thin is really nice when you hold the device with both hands, but when it comes to single handed operation, the grabfeel (I made that word up) is just piss poor! Yes, my Nokia N95 may be nearly twice as thick as the iPhone, but it is shorter and easier to hold. It feels comfortable in my hand. Seriously, it is no wider and taller than the original iPod Mini. Think about that for a second...

Insofar, I'm very happy with my purchase. And in the two days of using it at home, I stopped experiencing the mysterious sudden loss of cellular signal every once in a while when I'm at home in my condo in Chicago. I suspect it's probably because it has all four bands of the GSM spectrum. My Nokia N91 was missing the GSM 850 MHz, which is a predominant band that AT&T uses. Of course, I'll have to use it longer and see if I truly no longer have that issue.

Note: Of course, I'm not saying that my Nokia N95 is perfect. There are some flaws that I would like Nokia to address, but it certainly isn't near 10% of the flaws I found in the iPhone... Because of that, I'll write another entry in the future outlining the N95's flaws.


Opening and playing with the Nokia N95 right after returning home:


































Update 2007.10.01: I made some grammatical corrections and added a few information to make the flow of information clearer after removing a chunk of the original text above. The original text is archived below, which basically compared the Nokia N91 with the Apple iPhone.

The iPhone doesn't have 3G connectivity, other than the blazing molasses speed of EDGE. The aged Nokia N91 had both EDGE and 3G, albeit the 3G was not compatible with the US 3G frequency (you can blame American wireless carriers for that).

The iPhone's camera is nothing but a piece of crap! The aged N91 not only allowed me to take pictures with digital zoom, but it even had the video recording feature without limit (except for the free space on my 4 GB hard drive)! Many of my videos on YouTube from live concerts were captured on my N91!

The iPhone can play a limited number of audio formats, while my aged N91 could play almost every format imaginable (15 formats to be exact). Of course, it can't play Apple's proprietary DRM'ed music format.

The iPhone does not have any profile settings. If you want to modify the volume of the ringer, or toggle the vibrate feature, you have to go to different areas of the iPhone, akin to Microsoft Windows' Control Panel. All Nokia phones from years ago allowed you to predefine several profiles, and further letting you switch between profiles on the fly!

The iPhone's Bluetooth does not have many profiles. You can't wireless transfer files with another Bluetooth-enabled devices. My aged N91 can.

The iPhone, for its initial price, does not have any GPS-enabled phone! It has Google Maps. Google has long had their Google Maps software on the Symbian operating system such as the N91. I can even dial the phone number of the result from a search of seafood restaurants in San Francisco.

The iPhone is a closed system. Apple has long decided not to open its operating system so that applications can run freely on it. Instead, they may in the future allow a closed and restricted environment space for which applications can run in, which means the applications may not be very useful. A quick search on the Internet will show that there is a vast amount of software, mostly free, that can run on the Symbian operating system. Of course, with the recent hack, developers have begun writing applications for the iPhone, but they are not nearly as diverse and amount as what's out there for Symbian.

The iPhone does not let you pick any of your music library and set it as a ringtone. Instead, you have to pay an extra 99 cents to do that. On my aged Nokia N91, or any Nokia phone produced in the last many years, you can easily pick any MP3 file you have loaded on your phone as a ringtone!

Despite what Apple would like you to believe, they are not the first to come up with a browser that allows you to view the real Internet as many websites originally created. Nokia's browser on Symbian OS 3.0 allowed that two years ago! Here's a little surprise. Both the Nokia browser and Apple's Safari browser were built using the same open-source web kit!

Americans and the Environment

This is by no means a reflection of all Americans, but a good majority of us.

Except for me. =)

Having grown up in a developing country before settling in the United States, I have witnessed what life is like for the majority of people, who are below middle class, yet not exactly poor. It is pretty good and content. For the majority of Americans, they fall into the middle class group.

This middle class group makes me sick for the most part. Along with the rich. I know categorically I belong in the middle class group, but I am simply different. And weird, to boot. American middle class is obsessed with money and bragging rights. They have a strong desire to make it up to the rich category. Little do they know, those in the upper class are simultaneously getting richer. For example, the top few richest people are no longer millionaires, but billionaires! That is a far cry from what the benchmark was a decade ago when I was in college.

Anyway, this writing is not an in-depth look at the American middle class, but just an aspect of it. This is about the environment and cars. Yes, cars. Leave it to yours truly to somehow tie all his conversations and writings to one of his passionate topics (politics, environment, cars, comedy, girls and sex).

You see, the majority of the middle class Americans love to have things to show off. In this day and age where being green is not only cool and hip but also a status symbol, these people have gone hybrid crazy. This is not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, I commend them for making such efforts in buying vehicles equipped with hybrid engines. I think that is totally good; so good that I even chastise myself for driving a Land Rover. But I give myself a break in knowing the facts that a) it is the smallest compact SUV from Land Rover, b) I rarely drive it, and c) I rely on the Chicago Transit Authority's bus and subway trains a lot.

Herein lays the problem. When Honda and Toyota brought the Insight and Echo, respectively, to the United States eons ago, everybody wanted one. But they were small, and not exactly comfortable for the long-haul drives. For the next generation, the same two companies revamped their efforts in pushing hybrid technologies. Honda began adding hybrid trims into their existing line-ups, while Toyota initially went the opposite direction. Toyota instead created the next Echo, the Prius. It is distinct, and unique from the rest of the regular line-up. It wasn't much later till Toyota decided to add hybrid trims into their existing line-ups like Honda's approach.

Ever since this renewed push by these two companies, the Toyota Prius remains one of the most popular vehicles, outselling Honda's hybrid vehicles. The marketing and sales top brass at Honda were quite upset that Toyota was selling more hybrids than Honda, despite the fact that Honda was and still is the leading automobile company in the United States in terms of having the lowest emissions vehicles in their entire lineup!

A study revealed that the majority of hybrid buyers want to stand out and show off their pride in being green. Owning a car like the Honda Accord or Civic, or a Toyota Camry with the hybrid engines wasn't cool enough. It didn't scream, "Look at me, I'm eco-friendly!" Of course, only detail-oriented car buffs like me can tell you right away in a glance if that Honda Accord is a hybrid or a regular V6 engine. Because of that, Honda decided to revamp their approach in marketing their future hybrid vehicles, like making bigger badges indicating a model's hybrid engine under the hood as well as having slightly different styling cues to differentiate itself from the regular engine version of the same model. Likewise, Toyota is planning to capitalize the Prius name by turning its Prius model into a Prius line of vehicles with different models.

Again, this is all good. I can not care less* about how these automobile companies strategize to sell more vehicles. What really bothers me is why do automobile manufacturers have to change their strategies to match the decision making process of the majority of middle class buyers, the biggest demographic population in purchasing hybrid cars? The answer is simple: they want something to show it off! They want it for the bragging rights! Yet they're not asking their legislators to vote in favor of rejoining the Kyoto Treaty, or demanding laws be enacted to lower the average miles per gallon standards from manufacturers.

I look at the European Union, and think Wow, they are so much advanced and smarter than we are! Not only do they consider the miles per gallon (or really kilometers per litre), but they also look at another factor which is more important which many Americans don't even consider (save for the automobile executives worried about their bottom lines): the amount of carbon dioxide produced per distance driven. It's like people wanting a car with a biggest tank, but neglecting to think about the efficiency side of the equation. (For example, larger tanks do you no good if your engine guzzles gas at a faster rate.)

The European Union is so far advanced in law making that they have set a target limit of 130 grams per kilometer by 2012 for vehicles. Some countries even have frameworks in which to push demand for cleaner cars. For example, the United Kingdom currently will not levy any tax on owners of vehicles that produce less than 100 grams of carbon dioxide per kilometer, and any car emitting more than 225 grams per kilometer will be levied about $420 a year in emission tax.

So what does this all mean? For your reference, a Jaguar X-Type 2.0 produces considerably more than 225 grams of carbon dioxide per kilometer. It has a fairly common engine with similar specifications as the average car (American trucks and SUVs excluded) driven in the United States.

So what other vehicles currently out in the market produce less than 100 grams per kilometer? Well, the Honda Insight and a few other diesel powered Smart cars!

Now, I'm not saying that the majority of middle class Americans are stupid or ignorant. I truly believe that this is a reflection of poor public education, as well as a lethargic government that we have had for decades. While the European Union nations have long had clean diesel powered vehicles which Americans seem to hate, they are also drawing up laws on how to incentize (yes, I just created that word) buyers and nudge auto manufacturers into producing cars that not only have higher mileage efficiency, but consider the more important factor of the amount of greenhouse gas emitted per distance driven. Meanwhile, our own government is doing little to even put a dent on curbing our greenhouse gas pollution. We're not part of the Kyoto Treaty; we have a law demanding automobile vehicles to have a a minimum average miles per gallon level that is not only a joke, but full of loopholes that it cannot even hold water; and a tiny incentive in tax credit if you buy a designated hybrid vehicle.

Sigh. This all simply just makes me sick. And we leave it to foreign companies like Honda and Toyota to blaze the trail in bringing hybrid cars to the United States. How long did it take Ford to take that strategy? Only after more than a half decade later! And not only that, but people in general need to start thinking for themselves, get smarter, and nudge their legislators into enacting tougher laws.

It is no wonder the Big Three are not really all that powerful and profitable anymore. Moreover, the new Big Three is no longer an all American club after Toyota surpassed the former number three's market share.

* Here's a pet peeve of mine. I get slightly irritated when people say "I can care less" when they want to stress how much they don't care about something. Really, the expression is "I cannot care less." Think about it. Just like how people always say, "Nobody isn't here." Grr...

Resisting Temptation

On January 9, I wrote about getting the Apple iPhone right after Steve Jobs announced the product hours beforehand. Of course, I didn't stupidly proclaim that I will get the iPhone no matter what. I set some minimum standards, and waited patiently.

Then on June 29, I visited the Apple store in Chicago and played with the iPhone. At $599 for the 8 GB version, along with many shortcomings that simply pissed me off, I decided not spend any money on it for what I would be getting.

Basically, it boiled down to the mere fact that although the iPhone has a coveted usability feature that is leaps and bounds beyond the competition, its features are weak at best. To me, it's like buying a $30,000 car that has heated seats made from premium grade Italian leather, nice Momo steering wheels, huge sunroof, and a craptastic puny engine that is easily outperformed by a rusty Honda Civic from the late 80's. Oh, and it doesn't even have independent double wishbone suspensions!

Would you want to buy such a car? Sure, it certainly has some nice things, but overall, for what it is, I wouldn't even touch it. But what if the price of such a car suddenly drops to $20,000, a 33% price drop?

That is exactly what happened to the iPhone 19 days ago, on September 5. Steve Jobs made an unprecedented announcement that the price of the iPhone will be dropped 33%. My Apple fanatic friend, who initially said he wouldn't buy the iPhone, bought the iPhone on the day of its launch, quickly followed by a prompt return. His reason wasn't because of the product itself, but rather the level of service AT&T provided him. Then he bought the iPhone again, after two major factors: 1) the aforementioned price drop, and 2) the recent successful hack that unlocked the iPhone.

Ever since September 5, especially with the announcement of the unlocking hack immediately following, I've been contemplating whether or not I should just join in on the popularity bandwagon in owning an iPhone. Sure, the glorious 3.5 inch screen coupled with a sensational touch human interface is aimed to please the crowd. Hell, it can even serve as an icebreaker when I sit next to a hot chick on the plane while on a business trip!

Temptations, temptations, temptations. I for one have never been the show-off kind of a guy. But gee whiz louise! I don't know how much longer I can resist the dark force of such a temptation...

Holy Spam

So exactly last week, I got this email from God saying hello. No big deal, right? Except today, God is saying hello again!


I didn't know God was a spammer!

"No Engrish!"

Alternate Title: Compel me, dammit!

Since I've been working from home lately after the conclusion of my project out in the suburbs, I have finally understood why my answering machine gets so much action each day. For a while now, I've been pretty good with identifying telemarketing calls. A telltale sign would be the silence lasting about a second or two after you make a sound before someone picks up the phone and say, "Hello!"

Well, I've been bored lately. So I decided to see who these people are. On Tuesday, Sprint was the lucky recipient of my curiosity. Instead of saying the usual lame things like, "Maybe I'm John, maybe I'm not," or speaking in tongues (a mix between pig Latin and stuff I made up, or "Please help me, I killed the lady but she's too big for me to carry!" I decided to actually respond nicely.

And this Indian guy with a motor mouth who can probably speak a sentence in half the time I would take was telling me about how he can give me a free Sprint phone that was better than what I have, as well as a rate plan better than what I'm paying for. Of course, I got curious, because how did he know what kind of a phone I had? The conversation went something like this, and it would really help if you imagine an accent similar to Apu's:

Sprint: May I ask what kind of phone you have?

John: Sure! It's a Nokia N91.

Sprint: Uh-huh. John sir, I can give you a better phone! And best of all, it's free!

John: Okay, do you know what the N91 is?

Sprint: No, sir. But I can give you a better phone! You'll be amazed!

John: Okay, but why will I be amazed? What features does the phone have?

Sprint: It gives you early night calling, sir! It starts at 19:00 instead of 21:00!

John: Wait. That has nothing to do with the phone. Why would I want a free phone? Compel me!

Sprint: It has a color screen, and it can play music, sir!

John: Did you know that my N91 is an advanced smart phone, with a 4 GB drive for music, PDA functionality, WiFi and Bluetooth connectivity?

Sprint: I see. But this phone is better. And it's free!

John: Okay, but you haven't really described the phone to me, and I'm not convinced it is better than my Nokia.

Sprint: [feeling frustrated, so began to raise voice.] John sir, I'm giving you free phone! Why don't you want it?!?

[A crackle came on immediately, and a woman's authoritative voice chimed in.]

Sprint 2: Stay focused on the call.

John: Hello? What was that?

Sprint: Who do you have for your service?

John: AT&T.

Sprint: What kind of a rate plan do you have, and how much do you pay?

John: I have 900 rollover minutes, early night and weekend calls at 19:00, and unlimited data access for the Internet. And I pay $60 for it. [A lie.]

Sprint: John sir, Sprint can offer you a better plan!

John: Really? Please tell me more about it.

Sprint: Just for today, I can offer you a plan that you can't get anywhere else. For $49, you can get 450 minutes with early night and weekend calls!

John: Wait a minute. How is that better than my plan?

Sprint: John sir, it's easy. You are paying $60, and with Sprint, you'll be paying less!

John: Sure, I'm paying less, but it's not the same number of minutes.

Sprint: But you pay less!

John: Does it have data access?

Sprint: Yes sir.

John: So how much data allowance do I have a month?

Sprint: I don't know, sir. So you would like to sign up with Sprint?

John: No, I'm not ready yet. I'm still confused. You didn't answer me. Does the $49 plan include data access?

Sprint: No, but you can get it for a very nominal fee, sir. So where should I send you the free phone?

John: Okay, what is nominal? How much is nominal? Do I pay as I go? How much is it for 1 MB of data transfer? Or what kind of additional packages can I get? I want to know how much it would be for unlimited data access.

Sprint: John sir, don't worry, the data fee is very nominal, sir.

John: You keep on saying nominal, but I need to know the exact figure. Don't you have that in your pricing sheet?

Sprint: John sir, I don't know what a pricing sheet is.

John: But you're a salesperson!

Sprint: So do you want to sign up with Sprint? Clearly we can offer better phone and plan for you.

John: Wait. I am not yet convinced that you can offer a better rate, much less a better phone!

Sprint: But you don't have to pay for the phone!

John: Okay, if I do sign up for the service, you would have to record your statements and questions along with my responses with all the details regarding the verbal contract. So obviously for that reason you cannot use arbitrary terms like nominal. So what is the data fee?

Sprint: Great! So you want to sign up with Sprint! Is this your correct address...?

John: Wait, did you not listen to what I said?

So this goes on and on and on, with him going around in circles and not providing me with any real, concrete information. After seeing that I had been on the phone with this poor guy for over 20 minutes, I finally said, "Look, you're doing a poor job convincing me why you have a better phone and better rate plan, and you won't provide real details. I wouldn't hire you as my salesperson if I needed to sell something. You could have spent the last 20 minutes making at least 10 other calls."

The poor guy finally responded, "Have a good day, sir," before hanging up hastily.

Seriously, what the hell, right? So I forgot about the whole thing, until my friend and I were chatting about the iPhone and cellular phone service yesterday. He then brought to my attention about how Sprint cancelled over 1,000 contracts for customers who called customer service too much. I didn't hear about it, so I did a little research. Surely enough, Sprint did cancel subscribers who either called customer service too much, or roamed too much (although those serving in the Armed Forces will have their cancellations rescinded after catching hell). I spent over an hour reading everything I could about the whole thing.

Then the strangest thing happened. Another Sprint salesperson called right after I was done talking with my friend about Sprint, as if she felt her ears ringing and had the urge to call me up. With the news of Sprint's unreasonable contract cancellation still fresh in my mind, I promptly asked her, "Before I consider joining Sprint, may I ask will my contract be cancelled if I call the customer service too often?"

Her response was, "If you want."

I was actually speechless at her reply. Obviously, these Sprint salespeople were not trained to listen! If she had understood my question, she wouldn't have given such a ridiculous answer. So I just hung up on her, and forgot about it.

Then today, Sprint called me yet again! Damn! Sprint is sure persistent. And I don't blame them; especially they have the highest churn rate in the cellular service industry as well as the only cellular service company to lose money this year. After I picked up the phone, the following happened:

Sprint: Good morning, sir! How are you?

John: [thinking that the voice sounded familiar…] I'm fine. And how about yourself?

Sprint: I'm calling from Sprint, and I have a good deal for you!

John: Uhm, I just asked how you're doing. How are you?

Sprint: John sir, Sprint has... [A pause...]

John: Yes?

Sprint: No Engrish! [Click!]

The same bastard from Tuesday just called and hung up on me!!! I can't believe he actually told me he couldn't speak English! Oh my gosh! That was way too funny...

RTFM

I have spent a considerable portion of my career writing clear and concise documentation for projects that I have completed in the past, status reports and specially commissioned reports. As I'm rather anal about my written skills, I typically don't throw together a piece of junk like so many people do. Believe me, most people in the IT field tend to enjoy doing the technical work and loathe all other aspects of it, such as documentation.

I get especially annoyed when after spending so much sweat and blood in an important document, the person for whom the report is intended for comes to me and ask a bunch of basic questions, all of which are included in the report AND in the executive summary portion as well. Or when I wrote a instruction manual on how to make use of a relatively simple product with a table of contents, someone comes up to me and asks If I want to do this and that, how do I do it? My response has always been unequivocally the same: RTMF. Or in laymen's terms, read the fucking manual. Of course, if the person is someone important or my manager, I'll actually spend the time answering him/her, while hoping I don't Freudian-slip the choice words floating concurrently in my mind about him/her.

And I've been like this forever. And it seems so funny and ironic that today, I realized that I have been the kind of person I loathe so much for quite a long time now. You see, there is this really awesome image viewing application tool that I have been using for over five years now called IrfanView. It is simply the best, with so many things you can do, and it loads images the fastest of any other image viewing applications out there. Best of all? It's free. Of course, the purpose is not intended as something like, say, Adobe Photoshop, but provides quick and easy image and file manipulations typically desired by those who take lots of pictures and want some easy way of organization.

Anyway, for the longest time, I couldn't figure out how to crop out a section of the image and still maintain a desired standard width to height ratio typically found in standard prints. The typical standard keyboard/mouse combination methods employed by many other applications didn't work in IrfanView. And to work around that, I have been using other applications to do just that, and it was a pain in the ass. But this time, since I have recently reinstalled everything on my computer, I have yet to reinstall some other applications other than the critical ones. And I need to do a special cropping with a fixed ratio. But I couldn't find the other application to install, so I was a bit irritated.

Then the unthinkable happened. I opened up IrfanView, went to the Help manual, and did a search on keyword "crop". And what do you know?!? Number two in the hit list was the instructions on how to do the common standard ratio-locked cropping. Although it may not be the same procedure as other applications, it is quite intuitively simple. This feature has been there all this time, yet I have never used it for years. Or simply put, never bothered to spend 30 seconds to look up how.

Then I shook my head in disgust and whispered to myself, "Read the fucking manual; read the fucking manual."

My Online Pet Peeves

Aside from the usual suspects of multiple pop-up adverts that never seem to stop and flash-based adverts that look integrated within the web page but manage to float around and suddenly enlarge to cover up the entire article, I have a couple other pet peeves that I wonder if anybody else shares my frustration.

As you may already know, I am a member of the social networking sites MySpace and Facebook. I have yet to leverage their potential to meet other girls, and I sometimes wonder why I'm on MySpace period. As for Facebook, most of my friends are mostly all high school friends with whom I have lost touch in over 10 years and finally reconnected.

Anyway, Facebook allows you to access their speed-centric version of the website for free when you visit their site from a cell phone. Likewise, you get to choose between that and the full-blown version of the website if you have a smart enough smartphone like my Nokia N91 or the Apple iPhone. But MySpace? Unless you're lucky like me and other advanced Nokia and iPhone owners, you can't even get to MySpace by mobile means! Instead, you have to pay three dollars a month to Cingular-is-now-the-new-AT&T to get the watered-down version of MySpace! This pet peeve is such because of two reasons: 1) same reason as that of reason number eight of why I hate the iPhone, and 2) have you noticed how heavily subsidized MySpace is by advertisements?!? Why would anyone still want to pay three bucks after having to put up with the gazillion adverts that litter MySpace? I'm not targeting MySpace, but using it as a prime example of the many other websites that have this kind of business practices.

The second online pet peeve is how they collect information when you register for things online. This morning, I tried to register in a Sweepstakes at Mercury for some neat prizes, but I was having a difficulty submitting the registration form. Click on the picture below to see the full details of the "error" and the form I was submitting (personal data changed to protect my privacy):


What in the name of hell is that error all about? There is no red asterisk next to the email address field, meaning that field is not a requirement. I filled that in so that I could get notified by email if I win. But what prevented me from submitting the form was that I had to click on the checkbox asking if I want to be notified of new product information, offers and incentives! What? Why even provide the choice of opting out if I am being forced into it just so I can enter some stupid sweepstakes? This kind of marketing practice is not limited to sweepstakes administered for huge companies like Ford's Mercury. Remember the Put a Gun to My Head, Won't You blog in which I was forced to receive information from LaSalle Bank? That was while trying to register to run in the Shamrock Shuffle 8K race, which happened to be sponsored by LaSalle Bank! Let's see... If you want to participate in a race sponsored by us, you must endure the bombardment of product and service offerings literature from us! No if's, and's, or but's!

Oh, I can only feel my blood pressure rising, thanks to some shrewd marketing kid who don't know how to make good adverts in the first place and must resort to such brute force. Sigh...

D&D is Bad for You!

Seriously! What is wrong with people today? Consider the Straws, a couple from Reno, Nevada.

Michael and Iana, 25 and 23, met online when she was 16. They married, and had two children: a boy nearly two, and a daughter just 11 months old. The couple shared a common bond: computer games and the Internet.

The couple spent all their time playing the online game Dungeons and Dragons that they totally neglected to feed their children! The boy was starved to near-death, and did not have the muscle development to even walk. The baby was so dehydrated that she couldn't cry or pee, and did not have the muscle development to even lift her head.

Worse yet, the daughter has cat urine matted to her hair, that health care workers had to shave her head after being taken by social workers. The baby was born six pounds, but weighed in only 10 pounds at 11 months. Holy shit!

Even worse? The couple had baby food at home!!!

I'm surprised that they even found the time to mate! Some kind of people simply should not have the right to knock uglies and reproduce!

Click here to read more about this amazing story.

It's Finally Official!

Some time between 01:00 and 02:00 this morning, I noticed that my Nokia's carrier banner no longer reads Cingular. It is now a huge AT&T in all caps!

iPhone (finally)

I’ve been meaning to write about the Apple iPhone since June 29, but I had been unusually busy that I simply neglected to write anything at all. I’ve been working on the weekends, hanging out with recently-engaged Lucy while she visited Garth, playing sports and getting seriously hurt subsequently, watching the famous fireworks in Chicago before Independence Day, celebrating the holiday itself, throwing a dinner party, going to the Taste of Chicago festival, hanging out with friends till 03:30 in the morning, and tailgating before and attending the Dave Matthews Band concert with Guster headlining.

Phew! Even thinking and writing all that down pretty much drained the shit out of me. But now that I have some free time (sort of), I guess I’ll write something useful instead of snippets of news and what not. Remember on January 9, I wrote in my blog that I wanted to get the iPhone in less than an hour from when Steve Jobs announced the iPhone? Well... June 29 has come and passed. What came of it?

On Friday, June 29, I rounded up Sabine and Cesar for a happy hour at McCormick & Schmick’s on Wacker. The whole point was to check out the iPhone, which was released that day at 18:00 at the Apple store as well as some AT&T stores throughout downtown. But I’m not one to wait in line for any huge launch, like Philadelphia Mayor John F. Street, who actually waited nearly 15 hours in line to get the tech gizmo while ignoring his civic duties. Knowing that a store can’t possibly sell out on the first day, I wisely decided to spend my early evening drinking beer and eating finger food at happy hour, and waited till the news crews have packed up their cameras.

As I walked by an AT&T store along State Street after happy hour, I laughed at the people waiting in line to purchase the iPhone. Before heading over to the Apple store, I also managed to go shopping at Nordstrom Rack to kill some time before diving into the mosh pit that was the Apple store iPhone frenzy. Lucky for me, I found myself a new pair of work shoes and a pair of casual shoes. Nice!

Finally, when I went to the Apple store around 20:30, the line of people had disappeared, and all I could see was the temporary crowd control ropes along the sidewalk all barren. I simply walked right into the store, and waited behind a rather short line of people waiting to check out an iPhone on display. I would say that there were probably 20 or so iPhones on display. But I was smart, as I went to the back of the store where there were less people congregating around the display devices unlike the front of the store.

I have read and kept up with all news related to the iPhone between January 9 and June 29, and have decided that perhaps it was worth spending the 599 dollars with the known limitations and pitfalls. I was so ready to whip out my American Express Gold card and wait in the ridiculously long line of people waiting for the check-out register. But after just a few minutes waiting for some non-technical folks drooling over the phone, I was amazed that it was finally time for me to hold the much talked about device.

After playing with the iPhone for a little over 20 minutes (hey, if I was going to spend $600 that night, I was going to dig deep first, because after all, it was my very own hard-earned $600 I’ll be plunking down), I was simply disappointed and irritated. I realized quickly that this revolutionary gadget was not all that revolutionary! I thought the concessions I was going to make in order to purchase the iPhone was all the disappointments there were, I quickly found out that what I knew beforehand was simply 90% of the pitfalls. The other 10% of the pitfalls, which were not reported by early reviewers and rumors from Apple insiders, simply tipped me over the delicate balance between making the purchase and not.

Obviously I walked out of the store empty handed, save for the two pairs of shoes I had been lugging around since visiting Nordstrom Rack. Otherwise, I would have written a review with pictures of the iPhone the very next day.

Here is the list of all the new disappointments that I discovered that fateful night, which I will call the 10% factors:

1. Screen re-orientation: Despite what was said as revolutionary and shown in numerous television adverts, the automatic screen re-orientation based on how you hold the device is an utter piece of crap. Rather than building that functionality into the operating system layer, it was only a function of three applications: iPod, YouTube and Safari (web browser). And even worse, this function did not behave the same!

In the iPod application, the Cover Flow view would get turned on when you turn the iPhone 90 degrees in one way or another. But the sad thing is that if you turn it 90 degrees clockwise, the Cover Flow view simply became upside down, instead of being smart enough to turn it right side up. It was only designed to work if you turn it 90 degrees counter-clockwise! What the...?!?

Then the YouTube application or any video viewing application only allows you to watch it in the 90 degree counter-clockwise mode. Not regularly held mode. Huh? That doesn’t make sense to me, and shows how inflexible the iPhone can be when it comes to the extremely basic functionality!

2. Ring tone selection: For years, Nokia and other manufacturers have learned what consumers and end users wanted: setting our own ring tone based on any music file we have on the device, whether it be MP3 or a midi file. But what do you know? The iPhone only allows you to set ring tones based on what came with the iPhone, and what you can purchase from AT&T! What the...?!? You would think a revolutionary phone would take great ideas that have been around forever and improve on it, not take away bits and pieces of a culminated pool of great ideas!

3. Bluetooth that is utterly useless: The great thing about Bluetooth is that you can connect with other Bluetooth-enabled devices and do cool and fancy things together. One of the most important things about Bluetooth is the ability to transfer files wirelessly. For example, while at happy hour, Cesar sent me a picture of a cute chick he saw on the train from his Sony Ericsson phone to my Nokia phone. Just like that. And similarly, he liked a song that I had on my phone, so I sent it to him via Bluetooth. Just like that. Cool, right? This has been a rather useful feature of Bluetooth that has been around for years, yet for some reason, Apple decided to turn off the file transfer profile of Bluetooth! What in God’s name were they thinking?!?

4. Google maps without GPS: So what if you can use Google maps to get directions and find locations? It is not exactly revolutionary and something to brag about if the iPhone does not have GPS capability, something which several other phones already sport for over a year! Hell, my Nokia N91, which is a smartphone based on the Symbian operating system, is capable of running Google maps! All I have to do is go to Google and download the exact same application for Symbian! Likewise, people with Windows Mobile phones can download the same thing for their Microsoft operating system! So, uhm, exactly what is revolutionary and cool about this if I don’t have GPS like some other mobile devices?!?

5. Virtual keyboard that is not so smart: Seriously, I knew that people would have to get used to the virtual keyboard that is without any tactile feedback through time to learn how to use it. And as an Asian with way smaller fingertips than the average American, even I had a hard time typing away. I’m not exactly ranting against this particular design, but rather I’m disappointed that they didn’t take advantage of the re-orientation feature of the iPhone. You would expect that if you turn the iPhone 90 degrees counterclockwise, you would get a wider keyboard that is spaced out more, right? No way! Oh wait, I remember now... The screen re-orientation feature is NOT part of the operating system! Doh!!!

6. Useless camera: What can you do with the built-in camera with the iPhone? Nothing except point and shoot! Wait, this coming from the company that included built-in cameras in their top-of-the-line notebooks and LCD screens for a while? I asked an Apple employee why I couldn’t zoom in on shots. His response was that the camera didn’t have optical zoom, so it wouldn’t have mattered if it had digital zoom; you could always crop it later on. Well, if there was a stupid answer I have ever heard, it was that. I know that the picture quality on digital zoom is not that great, but the biggest benefit of being able to zoom in digitally before snapping the picture is composition, the most rudimentary aspect of photography! Apple, with their super smart programmers couldn’t include some basic software to take care of that?!?

Worse yet, it cannot record videos... Even my previous Nokia 7610 could record unlimited length videos as long as your memory has the space for it! And the 7610 isn’t exactly an advanced phone. Although it was based on the Symbian operating system, it was a precursor of the current generation of smartphones. And the Apple iPhone is supposed to be the next generation of smartphones? Come on!!!

7. Select, copy and paste: This is what irked me the most. A revolutionary phone based on the powerful Mac OS X operating system did not have any way for users to highlight, select, copy and paste text from the address bar of the web browser (or some other applications)? What the hell?!? This is so basic of any operating system that you would think a smart eight grade programmer can add! If I happened upon a very cool site, but it had a long URL like the City of Chicago’s website for the "Things to Do" section like so: http://egov.cityofchicago.org/city/webportal/portalSubChannelAction.do?
BV_SessionID=@@@@0706582129.1184139159@@@@&
BV_EngineID=cccfaddlghdjikjcefecelldffhdffn.0&
channelId=-9004&topChannelName=Residents
I would like to be able to select just a portion of the URL sans Session ID that I can copy and send to my friend. But no, I simply can’t do that. Why? Please don’t make me state the obvious...

8. Financial raping in the ass: When I first heard the news of the iPhone, I was particularly surprised at the unprecedented announcement of the exclusive partnership with AT&T for five years. Although exclusive partnerships are nothing new, the fact that it is five years is extremely unusual! I didn’t know what was to come, as pricing information of rate plans were under tight seals. Although my friend Changren pointed out that this is an issue with the wireless carrier, not Apple, I believe they are both equally at fault here because of this exclusive deal they have going on. Why do I have to pay an extra $20 for an unlimited data plan if I have the iPhone? My current Nokia N91 phone has both 3G and EDGE data technologies and my current regular unlimited data plan already allows me to browse "just the Internet." So why then is it more expensive to access the same data pipeline if I’m using the iPhone? After all, my Nokia N91 doesn’t render web sites in the "watered down version of the Internet, or the mobile version of the Internet, or the kinda sorta looks like Internet Internet" either! So if you take out everything my phone can do, then the only difference you’re left is that you are paying $20 a month just for the video voicemail service. Holy shit! Talk about an ass raping and fleecing of the American consumers!

Worse yet, the iPhone is not even capable of running on 3G technology, which allows you to have faster download speeds. You are forced to use the older EDGE technology! Granted, AT&T only has 3G networks in five major metropolitan cities (Chicago included) and EDGE everywhere else where GSM is available, but I cannot imagine that consumers are being forced to pay extra for slower shit! It’s like $35 a month for cable or DSL modem service at your home, but to get regular phone dial-up service by itself, you will have to pay an extra $20 on top of that! Especially when there is no need for AT&T to recuperate the cost because the iPhone is reportedly 100% unsubsidized! And all those people walking out of the Apple store with the iPhone in hand are okay with that? I’d say they’re idiots!

After experiencing and learning of the aforementioned eight additional pitfalls, I was so frustrated as a user that I stopped exploring the iPhone and realized that my Nokia N91 allows me to have a more intuitive user interface experience with more technological punch than the iPhone. To me, the iPhone’s only revolutionary advancement is multitouch user interface. Other than that, it failed miserably in all points of user interface basics. All Nokia and any other phone manufacturers have to do is to add a similar multitouch user interface to their existing phones and that in and of itself would have leapfrogged the iPhone immediately. And it isn’t all that hard to do. That is a pretty sad thing for a "revolutionary" smartphone.

It’s like sports cars that can go really fast, but incapable of performing the most basic tasks such as turning and stopping. Sheesh...

Of course, that doesn’t mean I don’t want an iPhone. After all, it does have a cool factor that no other smartphone can touch. But I’m just waiting for the next iteration of the iPhone which will hopefully have 3G, GPS and full Bluetooth technologies; as well as radio, motion picture capture and multi-format music playback capabilities; and improved software that will take care of the severe limitation in functionality of the phone. And even then, I will still not buy an iPhone until the GSM SIM card locking mechanism is breakable. After all, I could care less about the video voicemail, and would prefer I not spend the extra $20 and still maintain my regular unlimited data plan with AT&T.

Update: Good news! Apparently most of the software issues that I have been griping about are rumored to be fixed in conjunction with the release of Mac OS X Leopard. Let’s hope this pans out, as this will be a step towards the second iteration of the iPhone.